Twenty-Six is the Loneliest Number
by Nightmarish
Summary: When Buffy's past catches up to her, it's cheeky, fearless, and its name is Henry.
1. Twenty-Six is the Loneliest Number

**Oh, look! Another thing I do not own and make no money from.**

* * *

 **THE KEY** scrapes noisily against the sticky lock as Buffy struggles to open her apartment door one-handed.

"Oh, come on," she whines, jiggling the key back and forth with little finesse. "Not tonight."

Just when she's about to give up and break the damn lock, the worn tumblers finally give way with a soft _click_. Yeah, she definitely needs to get that fixed.

The apartment beyond is quiet and dark. She shifts the grocery bag she's clutching from one arm to the other so she can shrug off her leather jacket, wincing a little at the twinge of pain that shoots through her shoulder. Nothing's broken, but she thinks it must be at least sprained. She's certainly been thrown into enough tombstones to know.

"Happy Birthday!" Buffy mutters to herself sarcastically, because really, this is just par for the course. She kicks off her boots and tosses her stake absently down onto the kitchen counter with her keys and wallet. It clatters and rolls into the sink, leaving a trail of ashy dust behind.

Pale light from the city below flickers and glints at the edges of the floor-to-ceiling windows that Buffy still hasn't bothered hanging curtains over. In fact, she's done very little to the apartment in the six months since she moved in, and it shows. The walls are white and bare. The few books and objects scattered about skew more toward useful than decorative; titles like _The Encyclopedia Demonica, Vol. I-IV_ are piled haphazardly on the couch, there's a battered laptop charging on the coffee table, and an old throwing star is serving double duty as a coaster on the end table. The furniture is new, but it's Ikea.

Bland. Impersonal. Kind of pathetic.

Uncomfortably aware that she's beginning to summarize more than just her furnishings, Buffy pulls a bakery box out of the grocery bag and pops the lid. She'd been considering whiskey before she bought the cupcake, but getting drunk by herself on her birthday just seems…sad in the worst way.

Way sadder than a lonely cupcake.

She bites into it without ceremony, closing her eyes to fully relish in the sweet, sugary goodness, and does _not_ make a wish.

(Old habits die hard.)

(And if she _does_ make a wish, it's in her head and never, ever out loud, and it's not for something as pitiful as to not be alone on her birthday. She _doesn't_.)

There's a knock on the apartment door.

Buffy's eyes pop open and she swallows her mouthful of cake in surprise. "What the…?" she coughs.

She approaches the door warily. In the entire time she's been living in Boston, she's never had a visitor. Hell, she's never even encountered a nosy neighbor. Her apartment building is the kind of place where people keep to themselves, which is exactly why she chose it. That, and its proximity to three funeral homes. Hey, sometimes she feels nostalgic.

The hall is empty at first glance, but then she looks a little lower and finds a young boy, sharply dressed for his age with a backpack slung over his shoulder, looking up at her expectantly.

"Can I…help you?"

"Are you Buffy Summers?" the boy asks.

"Um, yes," Buffy confirms. "Who are you?"

"My name's Henry," the boy tells her cheerfully. "I'm your son."

He pushes past her into the apartment. Buffy is too shocked to stop him, but recovers herself quickly and chases after him.

"Whoa! Hold your horses, mister! I don't have a son!"

"Ten years ago. Did you give a baby up for adoption?" the kid – Henry – asks matter-of-factly. "That was me."

Buffy falls back, completely staggered. "…Give me a minute," she croaks.

She retreats to the bathroom. "Oh my god," she whispers to her wide-eyed reflection. " _Oh my god._ "

Buffy has spent the better part of a decade pretending her life started in Sunnydale. Ten years _feels_ like a lifetime. Three lifetimes, if she wants to get technical, and she should, shouldn't she? She is currently on the verge of hyperventilating in her bathroom because of one teensy, tiny, miniscule technicality.

Technically…she is someone's mother.

A living, breathing, ten-year-old someone. Not a distant hypothetical _what-if_ that has been carefully pushed aside and locked away with the rest of her post-calling, pre-Sunnydale memories. A real boy, with his father's hair and Buffy's eyes.

Her heart is hammering painfully in her chest and she wonders for a moment if she is actually going to throw up. She might. She breathes hard through her nose and pushes the impulse down.

"Hey, what's this stick for?" Henry calls from the other room. "It kind of looks like a – "

Buffy swoops back into the kitchen and grabs the stake out of his hands. "Here, have a cupcake," she says, and hands him her barely-touched birthday treat instead.

He takes a large bite without question and chews happily. "You know, we should probably get going," he tells her through a mouthful of frosting.

"Going?" Buffy repeats faintly. "Going where?"

"I want you to come home with me," Henry tells her seriously. Just like that. Simplest thing in the world.

Buffy laughs humorlessly. "Okay, kid. I'm calling the cops." She reaches for her phone.

"Then I'll tell them you kidnapped me," Henry counters quickly.

Buffy retracts her had slowly. "And they'll believe you because I'm your birth mom," she concludes.

Henry grins, teeth stained blue from the icing. "Yep."

Buffy narrows her eyes. "You wouldn't."

"Try me."

It's a good act, she'll give him that. But Buffy spent the majority of her teenage years lying to authority figures, not to mention she recognizes the kid's expression as the one her sister favors when she's laying the BS on really thick.

"Nope, not buying it," she tells him, shaking her head. Damn it, he even _looks_ kind of like Dawn. She unlocks the screen on her phone.

"Wait!" Henry says quickly. "Please don't call the cops. Please, come home with me."

"Where's home?" she asks, mentally reviewing her options.

 _This is a bad idea._

"Storybrooke, Maine."

"Storybrooke. Seriously?"

Henry nods, looking hopeful.

 _A really, really terrible idea._

Buffy sighs. "Alrighty then. Let's get you back to Storybrooke." 

* * *

As she loads him into the car, she considers calling someone – Giles, Willow, anybody – but ultimately decides against it. She is _not_ ready for the conversation that will inevitably follow.

 _I'm just taking a little road trip to Maine to return the biological son I had at 16 to his adoptive parents._

She snorts. _Yeah, right_. Dawn is the only person who even has an inkling that she gave a baby up for adoption once upon a time, and Buffy isn't even sure how much her little sister remembers. She'd only been nine or ten, and it's a topic that wasn't discussed after their parents divorced and they moved to Sunnydale.

"What's wrong?" Henry asks perceptively as he settles into the passenger seat of Buffy's beat up Chrysler.

"Nothing," Buffy says. She starts the ignition and cranks the heat. "You know, I think you should call your parents and let them know you're okay. And, you know…not kidnapped."

"Can we stop somewhere?" Henry changes the subject.

"What? We _just_ left!"

"Yeah, but that cupcake made me thirsty."

"This is not a road trip," Buffy reminds him. She glances at the dashboard. "Fine, we need to fill up anyways. You can get something at the gas station."

"Do you have any money?" Henry asks unapologetically.

Buffy eyes him suspiciously out of the corner of her eye. "How exactly did you get from Maine to Boston without any cash?"

Henry wiggles guiltily in his seat. "I used a credit card," he hedges.

"And you can't use it now because…?

"Because it's not mine?"

"Great, glad to see kleptomania runs in the family," Buffy mutters under her breath as she pulls up next to a free pump.

"What's kleptomania?"

"It means you're a thief," Buffy tells him shortly, cutting the engine. She fishes a ten dollar bill out of her purse. "Here. Go get something to drink."

"Thanks!" Henry takes the money and bolts out of the car.

"Hey, kid!" she calls after him.

"Yeah?"

"…Get me some M&M's?"

The boy flashes a huge megawatt grin.

"You know, I have a name," he reminds her happily. "It's Henry."

* * *

As they make their way steadily north, Buffy can't stop herself from glancing sideways at her small passenger every few minutes, just to assure herself that she isn't dreaming. Or having a nightmare; she hasn't decided.

"What's with the book?" she breaks the silence, pushing uncomfortable memories away.

"I'm not sure you're ready," Henry tells her seriously.

Buffy raises her eyebrows, but focuses on the road. "I'm not ready for some fairytales?"

"They're not fairytales," Henry denies. "They're true. Every story in this book actually happened."

"Right."

"They did!" Henry insists. "You could tell I was lying before – this is the truth."

"Just because you believe something doesn't make it true," Buffy tells him, but the words taste false in her mouth.

"That's exactly what makes it true," Henry argues. "You should know more than anyone."

"What?!" Buffy's grip on the wheel tightens. "What are you talking about?"

 _Is it a book about vampires?_

"Because you're in this book."

 _Crap, it is_.

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are."

"Nope. Can't be. Must be some other Buffy."

"How many Buffys do you think there are?" Henry asks her dryly.

"Jeez, it's not that weird a name."

"It kind of is."

"Kid, you've got problems."

"Yep," Henry agrees cheerfully. "And you're going to fix them."

* * *

Storybrooke, Maine is pretty much exactly like it sounds. Small, quiet, New England-y. It actually reminds Buffy a lot of Sunnydale, minus the graveyards. The comparison is not reassuring.

"Okay, buddy. How about an address?"

"Forty-four Not Telling You Street," Henry replies promptly. He dozed a bit on the last leg of the drive, but as soon as they passed the town line he's been wide awake and as snarky as ever.

Buffy stops the car a little more abruptly than is strictly necessary. "You are such a little shit," she tells him tiredly, unbuckling her seatbelt. She gets out of the car and rolls her shoulder. "Look. It's been a _really_ long night, and it's almost…8:15?" She stares up at the clock tower in surprise.

"That clock hasn't moved my whole life," Henry tells her. "Time's frozen here."

"You mean the clock is broken?"

"No, the Evil Queen did it with her curse. She sent everyone in the Enchanted Forest here."

Buffy's neck prickles. "You didn't say anything about a curse," she says sharply.

"You believe me?" Henry says hopefully.

"That an Evil Queen froze time and sent a bunch of fairytale characters to Storybrooke, Maine? Debatable." She shakes her head, the queasy feeling in her stomach returning. "You shouldn't joke about curses."

"It's true! Everyone here is trapped," Henry explains. "If they try to leave, bad things happen."

"Henry!" A man walking a Dalmation jogs up to them. "What are you doing here? Is everything alright?"

Buffy sighs. It's going to be a long night.

* * *

Regina Mills gives Buffy seriously weird vibes – and not _just_ because she's the Mayor.

Buffy doesn't have a bias against small-town mayors. No, really.

She eyes the woman critically over the rim of her cider glass as she takes a polite sip. The phrase _tight-laced_ springs to mind. Regina is clearly a woman who likes to have everything under control. Her pristine house and slick, professional appearance is testament to that. Buffy, who feels decidedly rumpled after the long car ride, suddenly and irrationally hates her for it.

"And the father?"

Oh. Regina is asking her a question.

"There was one," Buffy says vaguely.

"Do I need to be worried about him?"

"Only if Henry has magical psychic powers."

"Excuse me?!"

"His father doesn't know he exists," Buffy clarifies, a little snappier than she intends to. "I never told anyone who he was. His name isn't on any documentation. The only way Henry could possibly track him down, too, is if he has prophetic dreams or something. Which is a joke. Obviously."

Regina stares at her. "Do I need to be worried about _you_ , Miss Summers?"

Buffy bristles. "I didn't go looking for Henry. _He_ found _me._ I'm just bringing him home." _You're the one who didn't even realize your ten-year-old hopped a bus to Massachusetts,_ she adds meanly in her head.

It isn't quite the answer Regina is looking for, but the Sherriff chooses that moment to reappear. After he lets himself out, Regina tries to make peace.

"I'm sorry he dragged you out of your life," she says. "I really don't know what's gotten into him."

Buffy shrugs. "He's a kid. Kids act out. I get it."

"You have to understand," Regina continues. "Ever since I became mayor, balancing things has been tricky. You have a job, I assume?"

"I'm a freelance security consultant." It's the standard line, these days. "And a former high school guidance counselor, so when I said I understand what Henry's going through, I meant it," she adds for good measure. Not at all because Regina posed the question like she expected the answer to be "no."

"Ah," Regina says, her smile tightening. "Well, imagine having another job on top of that."

 _I wonder what that would be like_ , Buffy thinks dryly.

Regina plows ahead, giving her some spiel about being a single mom and how rules are good, yadda yadda yadds, but Buffy stops listening. She's suddenly eager to get out of the mayor's picture-perfect house and her quaint, rule-abiding town.

"It's a long drive back to Boston," she manages to interject finally. "I should be heading out."

Regina nods. "Of course."

She's shown out. When she reaches the car, she glances back up at the house. Henry's small, pale face peers down at her from one of the second story windows. Buffy looks away. Time to put the past back where it belongs.

* * *

Except – Henry is a sneaky little devil, and there _was_ a wolf in the road, and Buffy was never all that great of a driver to begin with.

After she flattens the _Leaving Storybrooke_ sign and her vision starts to blur, she has just enough time to think that Spike would be so proud.

* * *

She stays.

She does call Giles eventually.

Well, she calls his secretary and leaves a message about taking a vacation from the city, she'll call back in a couple of weeks, not to worry, blah blah blah. It's admittedly a dick move, but she's still not ready to talk about how she never told any of them how she got pregnant at fifteen and only found out after her Baby Daddy hit the road and her parents committed her to a mental hospital, and then convinced her to give up said baby for adoption.

Giles just has this way of knowing when she's holding something like that back, you know?

It takes her less than a week to figure out that Regina Mills hates her guts; Mr. Gold ( _Rumpelstiltskin_ , according to Henry) is a slimy, slithery snake; and that something is very, _very_ off about Storybrooke, Maine.

Oh yeah – and she gets arrested. Again.

So she takes an axe to the mayor's apple tree in lieu of strangling the woman (which would be regicide either way, she amused herself thinking, because even if Henry's Evil Queen theory is bunk, her name's still _Reg_ ina…get it?), seriously considers sleeping in a crypt for a couple of nights when no one is willing to take her money, moves into Snow White's spare bedroom, nearly delivers Cinderella's baby in a ditch, and maybe-kinda makes a deal with the devil.

 _This is your life, Buffy Summers_ , she thinks.

She leans back against the hood of her car and presses her phone to her ear.

"Graham? It's Buffy. I was thinking…Maine's not so bad this time of year. That deputy job still open?"


	2. The Curse 1

Note: This chapter opens in the middle of OUaT episode 1.06 "The Shepherd". Be warned that time may jump or even run backwards between installments.

* * *

To say that the night life in Storybrooke is lacking would be an enormous understatement.

The town's inhabitants are, hands down, the most habitual creatures Buffy has ever encountered, and their habits mostly seem to involve quiet nights in. From the perspective of law enforcement, it's an absolute dream. Buffy isn't surprised that Graham has gone this long (although exactly how long remains a question no one has been able to answer satisfactorily) without a deputy, because even the lawbreakers in Storybrooke are habitual.

When Graham hires her, he makes a point of promising no night shifts – and she thinks it would be kind of weird to argue, so she doesn't, but Buffy can only fight her nature for so long. She's made for moonlight and shadows. Mary Margaret's apartment is warm and lovely and already feels achingly like home, but that doesn't stop Buffy from lying wide awake in bed long into the night, feeling twitchier than a crack addict looking for her next high.

Finally, the night of David Nolan's "welcome home" party, she just can't take it anymore.

She waits until Mary Margaret is asleep and snoring softly before shimmying into a pair of tight yoga pants and a sweatshirt. She jams a black knit hat down over her bright hair and slips out of the apartment and into the night.

She mentally congratulates herself on the brilliance of her plan as she jogs down Main Street. It is, as expected, completely deserted. Running helps take the edge off of her pent up energy, and what's more, it provides an easy cover story for why she's roaming the town so late at night. People never asked questions like that back in Sunnydale, and they certainly don't in cities like Boston or L.A. but Storybrooke is different. It has Regina Mills, for one thing, and Buffy _knows_ Madam Mayor is just looking for a reason to mistrust her.

She keeps running.

Her breath huffs out in little bursts of steam in the cold winter air. Turns out, the weather in Maine _isn't_ so great this time of year. Buffy entertains a brief fantasy of lying on a beach somewhere in the Mediterranean.

Her legs carry her onwards, past the empty shops on the main drag, some with dim window lights left burning to deter trespassers and hooligans, just as many without (crime is habitual in Storybrooke, remember?); past the boarded up library; past the hospital; past the station where she'll stumble into work ten minutes late tomorrow morning, bleary-eyed and half asleep until she's consumed at least two cups of bitter coffee; and on.

The streets give way to residential neighborhoods. She nearly turns up the street that leads past the Mayor's mansion, but ultimately doesn't. She wants to know if Henry's bedroom light is on, but what will she do with the information if it is? Throw rocks at his window? Scold him for staying up past his bedtime?

She loops around and heads in the other direction. The houses are smaller and spaced farther apart here, and the winter-ravaged woods loom tall before her, all-but consuming the horizon. The street she's on peters out abruptly into a dirt path. A hiking trail, probably. It gets narrower as it twists and turns and the wooded brush gets wilder on either side, but she pushes forward, curiosity driving her on. She half-expects a fallen tree to bar her way at any moment, but then the path opens up again suddenly, and she's running on gravelly rock.

She keeps moving forward for several paces before her feet catch up to her brain and she slows to a confused halt. She has emerged in what appears to be a very large clearing. The woods are thick behind her, and stretch out in sweeping curves to both sides. She can't tell if the tree line meets again in an unbroken circle in front of her because the castle is blocking her view.

"Oh, you have got to be joking," Buffy says out loud to no one in particular.

She stands glued to the spot with bemused disbelief for a few beats before collecting her wits and marching forward. She stalks around the side of the enormous stone eyesore and climbs the steps to the front door two at a time. She slams the heavy iron doorknocker three times. A hairline fracture splinters the wood along the grain.

The door swings open almost immediately on surprisingly well-oiled hinges. There is no one on the other side.

Buffy mutters a couple of obscenities under her breath and steps inside. There are torches blazing merrily in the wall sconces, casting pools of warm, flickering light at regular intervals along the stone wall, but the place is quieter – pardon the lazy pun – than the grave.

Buffy isn't fooled.

"You have exactly twenty seconds to explain what you are doing in Storybrooke," she tells the empty air.

There's a faint _whoosh_ of displaced air and a cool presence at her back.

"Ah, Buffy," a familiar voice wraps itself around the syllables of her name, the sound of it uncomfortably close to her ear. "I was wondering when you would seek me out."

His accent doesn't _quite_ pronounce the W's as V's, but it's a close thing.

Buffy turns and folds her arms across her chest. "Fifteen seconds," she amends. "And I didn't _seek_ you. There was no seeking."

Dracula raises one thick eyebrow and smiles at her with just the barest hint of fang. "Or what?" he drawls. "You will – " he pauses here for effect " – stake me?" He makes a little laughing sound at the back of his throat and shakes his head.

"Ten, nine…" Buffy begins to count down loudly.

"You are not armed," Dracula points out, interrupting her. He disappears and reappears melodramatically a few scant feet away from her, eyes trained on her throat. "You do not even wear a cross."

"I'm in the mood to punch something," Buffy says evenly, and _gods_ , she hopes she'll get the chance. She's been jonesing for a fight all day. All of the small-town bull crap she's been dealing with lately is rendering her patience nil.

Dracula retains his air of vague amusement. It's even more annoying up close. "You will always seek the darkness," he tells her knowingly, leaning in like he's letting her in on an intimate secret. "It is in your nature."

"Let me guess, you're the darkness. Geez, self-centered much?" Buffy scoffs. "Get a new sales pitch, that one is _so_ turn of the century."

"Yet here you are," Dracula says, unconcerned. "As I knew you would be." He takes a step closer. If he could breathe, he'd be breathing her recycled breath. "As it was prophesized."

Buffy sighs the long, put-upon sigh of someone who's heard this kind of thing before. Because, you know, she _has_.

"Okay, spell it out for me," she says. "You knew I would come here because my nature 'seeks the darkness'. Great. Fabulous. What now? You…try to convince me that blood's just an acquired taste and I should reconsider the whole pesky pulse? Look, it was kind of flattering the first time around –"

(It was more than a little flattering, but she's trying very hard to suppress the little fangirl-ish twinge of excitement that's welling up in her even now. Because, _Dracula_.)

" – but if this is all just some grand scheme to get a little Slayer neck action or turn me into one of your slut-tacular Brides, then sorry, _not interested_. I don't date vampires."

 _Anymore_ , her treacherous mental voice tacks on unhelpfully. She probably should have just left that last bit off entirely.

Dracula just keeps smiling his smirk-y little smile. "Now it is I who is flattered," he tells her, the picture of modesty. "Another time, perhaps. I'm sure you remember the pleasure that can be had in – "

"Stop!" Buffy interrupts him hastily. "Stop talking, please."

Dracula does stop, and finally looks at her with something akin to seriousness. Some of his affected mannerisms fall away, and when he moves again, even the way he carries himself is different. He takes a step backwards this time, and opens his arms to gesture widely. It's like watching a slow-motion imitation of his usual dramatics.

"You are here to break the curse," he tells her simply.

 _Say_ _what_ _?_


	3. The Curse 2

Buffy returns to her apartment just as the pale rays of first light begin to stretch across the winter sky. She's only got a few hours before her shift at the station starts, but she's too wired to try to sleep. Going for a run to clear her head unfortunately had the opposite effect. Her mind is whirring and churning with new problems that she has no idea how to solve.

At least figuring out what she's going to do about Dracula can wait for a few more hours. She'd left him safely tucked away in his coffin, and she figures that worst comes to worst, she can just set the stupid thing on fire. Sleeping during the day is apparently not optional for his kind of vampire (whatever the hell kind that is) so she has until the evening to figure out a game plan.

The simplest of her problems can be taken care of with a quick shower, so she locks herself in the bathroom and strips out of her sweaty running clothes. She turns the taps to hot and brushes her teeth while the water warms up. Then she turns the taps halfway back to cold, because after her jaunt in the freezing February night, even lukewarm water burns her hands and feet. Once she finally gets it to an acceptable temperature, she steps under the spray and moans out loud with relief.

There's something stabilizing about closing her eyes and letting the water pound against her back. It's been a very long couple of weeks since Henry shanghaied her into driving him back to Storybrooke. She can still hardly believe her son is real and tangible and has thoughts and a personality. He existed for so long as a hazy dream; a road not taken, nothing more. Meeting him, getting to know him – that would be enough for any normal person to have to worry about. Does Buffy ever get normal? Nope. She gets fairy tale curses and Count-fucking-Dracula.

Her thoughts turn back to her less-easily-surmountable problems, and she finishes rinsing the shampoo out of her hair quickly before shutting off the water. She wraps herself in the big fluffy bathrobe that Mary Margaret had given her as a Welcome to Storybrooke/Happy Belated Birthday present after she moved into the apartment. Mary Margaret is incredibly sweet like that, in case inviting a stranger into her home wasn't enough of a clue-in.

It's still early, but as she gets dressed she realizes that now might be the perfect time to do a little private research down at the station. She scrawls a quick note for Mary Margaret and tucks her damp hair up into a hat. She's halfway out the door before something else occurs to her and she doubles back to grab something from the drawer of her bedside table. She shoves it deep into her coat pocket before descending once more into the bitter cold.

The early morning sunlight is still weak and watery which makes for a bracing walk to the station, but she's inside and booting up one of the ancient computers, while a pot of coffee brews in the tiny kitchenette, within five minutes. While she waits on both Mr. Coffee and Windows '95, she meanders curiously around the office. She hasn't had much of a chance to snoop yet.

It's pretty standard fare, as far as she can tell. Informational pamphlets on the credenza in the lobby advising citizens on Stranger Danger and the perils of smoking. The phone numbers for poison control, the hospital, Granny's, and the local trash company are carefully printed in black sharpie on the fill-in-the-blank lines of an Emergency Numbers magnet stuck to the refrigerator in the kitchen. One small conference/interrogation room, devoid of anything interesting whatsoever. The holding cell, which Buffy is intimately acquainted with. A small closet next to the bathroom that offers up some cleaning supplies and a tattered Monopoly box.

Graham's office is, as she had been warned, an unmitigated disaster. He's got a nice desk, but you'd never know because it's covered in piles of unfiled paperwork and haphazardly stacked manila folders. Buffy yanks open each desk drawer in turn. Post-it notes and other miscellaneous office supplies (boring), spare handcuffs (kinky if he was anyone other than the Sheriff), a copy of _Bowhunter_ (everyone needs a hobby?), some mints (practical), and wedged carefully inside a photocopied handbook detailing how to identify poisonous plants native to New England, an eight-year-old issue of Playboy ( _naughty_ – she's going to tease him later).

The desk declared a bust, she heads back to the kitchenette to pour herself a mug of coffee. She adds a generous splash of creamer to the rat poison Graham stocks (which she will be replacing next trip to the grocery store) and settles down in front of her computer. She logs in and opens up an internet browser. She checks her e-mail. There's an inter-slayer memo about a raid on a vampire nest that went down the previous weekend in Atlanta (taken care of, 0 casualties), a chatty message from Xander wishing her a belated Happy Birthday from the Andean Mountains where he's currently traveling, a chain e-mail that Andrew forwarded to her with the subject line "Share Within 12 Hours To Find The Name Of Your True Love!" that she deletes without opening, and an overdue book notice from the Boston Public Library. She winces, trying to remember if she saw the book when she was unpacking her meager belongings.

Feeling guilty, she quickly exits out of the browser and refocuses her attention on the task at hand. Right. If she was a clue, where would she be?

She clicks around for a few minutes, skimming the shared network files and installed programs in the vague hope that something will jump out at her. Nothing. No helpful folders labeled "mysterious curses" or "suspicious magical activity". She slumps back in her chair with a sigh. This isn't working.

She scans the room again, trying to think. She'd had a thought that maybe something in the police records would turn up a potential line of inquiry. She's embarrassed to admit that she'd been hoping she could just type a few searches into the computer and _presto!_ the pertinent information would pop up. They always make that look easy in the movies.

Part of the problem seems to be that the Storybrooke Sherriff's Department has clearly not yet caught up with contemporary technology. Graham himself, for all that he looks like a hipster Abercrombie model, confessed to being old-fashioned. So maybe she's just looking in the wrong place?

She downs the last of her coffee and heads back to his office. She takes another look at the stacks of paperwork piled on his desk. Mostly, it seems to be incident reports. Drunk and Disorderly, Drunk and Disorderly, Drunk and Disorderly…She thumbs through the top inch or so and finds more of the same. She double-checks the name on all of them. Apparently she's found the Leroy stack.

Beginning to frown, she abandons the desk and moves to the filing cabinets. They appear slightly more organized. The hanging file folders are arranged chronologically by month, all labeled with Graham's scrawling hand. She opens one at random, and scans the contents. She looks at the previous month, and the one before that. On a hunch, she moves to another drawer and yanks it open. More of the same.

Sitting back on her haunches, Buffy does a quick mental calculation of the odds of a person being arrested for the exact same crime every single day for 20+ years. She never took statistics in school, but she's pretty confident that the answer is slim-to-none. Regularly occurring noise complaints, minor fender benders, graffiti…they're all issues that could plague any small town, but every day? How is it even _possible_ to blow out a tire on the exact same curb Monday through Sunday for decades?

It's not.

Buffy returns the folder to where she found it and slides all of the drawers closed. There's a churning sensation in her stomach that isn't entirely from skipping breakfast. She's been trying to work out another way to spin this whole thing, but she can only willfully ignore the signs for so long. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, chances are, it's a duck.

What she's got here? One big, fat duck-curse. Well, not like a cursed duck because that would be terrifying, or a curse that turns you – never mind. Forget the metaphor. Serious magical mayhem is afoot.

Self-diagnosed Sunnydale Syndrome acknowledged, Buffy goes to pour herself another cup of coffee. She sips it slowly, leaning back against the counter to mentally review the details. _Usually, this is the part where Giles polishes his glasses and comes up with a plan_ , she thinks morosely. She doesn't like being plan-girl.

The evidence in Graham's reports supports the running theory that time is – was? – frozen in Storybrooke. Henry may have spent the last ten years growing up and changing, but everyone else was a one-note symphony. She's certain of that now.

And if she's _completely_ honest, it's not even the fairytale characters part that she's having trouble with. She has plans to meet up with _Dracula_ later tonight, for Heaven's sake. No, the issue is Henry's deep-seated belief that she is 'Princess Buffy' of the Enchanted Forest. How can she be Storybrooke's Savior when she's already the Slayer? In Buffy's very strong opinion, she's already about as chock-full of destiny as it is possible to be.

The sound of a door opening and footsteps in the hall snaps Buffy out of her contemplations. She adopts what she hopes is an innocent and vaguely inquisitive expression.

It's only Graham.

"Sometimes, clichés are true," he says in lieu of a greeting, hefting a box of donuts in her direction with a smile.

Buffy's stomach grumbles loudly right on cue. "Got anything with rainbow sprinkles?" She takes the box and pops the lid. She's halfway through a vanilla-frosted and eyeing up a Boston Crème before he can answer.

"Erm, sorry," she says through a mouthful of sugar. She swallows, and offers him the box back. "I was hungry?"

Graham grins and takes a jelly-filled. He doesn't seem bothered by her rudeness. "I'm glad, because the donuts were actually a bartering chip, and since you've already started inhaling them…"

Buffy narrows her eyes, and sets the Boston Crème delicately back in the box. "What," she says flatly.

"Remember when I said no night shifts?" Graham begins guiltily. "I need you to work tonight. Just this once."

"Okay, no biggie." Relieved that it's something easy, Buffy retrieves her donut and takes an enormous bite. It's perfect, actually. Surely keeping an eye on an infamous villain counts as keeping the town safe? Getting paid to do it is even better. Two vamps, one stake.

"Really?" Graham looks more surprised than pleased, like he expected her to put up a fight.

"Yeah, no worries. Got a hot date?"

He grins at her. "Nothing so exciting, I'm afraid. I volunteer at the animal shelter, and the woman who runs it is sick. She needs someone to feed the dogs."

Before she can respond, Mary Margaret appears in the doorway. She doesn't bother with pleasantries either, nor does she come bearing snacks.

"Buffy, can I talk to you for a minute?" She glances sideways at Graham.

He takes the hint. "I'll just go patrol my office," he says, and beats a hasty retreat.

"He left his wife," Mary Margaret blurts out. "David – he left her. He left Kathryn."

"Really?" Buffy says, but she's not all that surprised. Coma-induced amnesia or not, it's obvious that there is no chemistry there.

"He did it for me," Mary Margaret continues. "He wants me to be with him. He wants me to meet him tonight."

"Are you going to?"

"I don't know! I shouldn't, or maybe I should, but I don't know how to let him down!" Mary Margaret babbles frantically.

"Okay, breathe," Buffy commands. "Eat a donut." She holds out the box and Mary Margaret takes one automatically but doesn't eat. "Now answer me honestly – do you want to be with him?"

"But Kathryn – "

"Forget about Kathryn," Buffy interrupts. "He left her. They are not together anymore. He's already made his choice, whether you decide to be with him or not." She takes a bite out of a plain glazed and chews thoughtfully. "I think you should."

"What?"

Buffy swallows. "Be with him. See where it goes. You obviously like him and he's head over heels for you. What with the leaving his wife and all."

"Regina is _not_ going to like that," Mary Margaret dithers.

"Regina can shove it where the sun don't shine."

Mary Margaret considers that. "Good Lord," she says after a moment. "Is this really happening?"

Buffy shrugs and takes another enormous bite. "You tell me," she says inelegantly through her mouthful.

* * *

Later, as the afternoon sinks into evening, Buffy retraces her steps back to the edge of the town. She takes the cruiser this time, because a) it's freezing, and b) it makes her feel all official. On her way home that morning she'd discovered a proper driveway on the opposite side of the castle to the hiking path; full of potholes, but wide enough to get a car through.

As she bumps and jolts along, praying to no one in particular that she won't get a flat tire, she reconsiders the intelligence of her plan. Honestly, she's not even sure what she expects to gain from talking to Dracula again. After their initial discourse the night before, things had devolved quickly into cryptic and vaguely suggestive banter that answered none of Buffy's questions. Just when she'd been about to throw civility out the window and stake the bastard, he had bafflingly announced that the sun was close to rising and he must retire to his coffin.

"No good, older-than-dirt, bloodsucking fiend," Buffy mutters under her breath as she cuts the engine and unbuckles her seatbelt. "I bet he was bluffing. Asshole."

"Now, now," Dracula speaks out of the darkness beside the car. "There is no need to be a complete bitch."

Buffy yelps in surprise and clamps a hand over her chest in an attempt to quell her erratic heartbeat. "Don't _do_ that!" she says, glaring up at him through the driver's side window. "God!"

"If you like," Dracula replies easily, his voice muffled through the glass. "You are late. The sun over an hour ago."

"We never agreed on sunset," Buffy argues, rolling down her window. "In fact, I never agreed to meet at all. I'm still not sure why I'm here. Maybe I should just slay you and call it an early night."

Dracula raises one heavy eyebrow.

Buffy rolls her eyes and jabs a finger at the button to unlock the passenger side door. "Get in."

To her surprise, Dracula complies without fuss. He even buckles his seatbelt like a good little vampire. Buffy puts the car in reverse and spins it around in a spray of gravel. Dracula, to his credit, does not comment.

"So, talk," she demands, flicking on the high beams as the car re-enters the densely wooded drive. "Curse?"

"Surely you have noticed the plight of this town," Dracula begins. "Those piteous fools are cursed to live the same day over and over and never notice that nothing in their lives ever changes. Time does not move forward for them. They do not grow or age or _die._ "

"There might be some evidence to support that theory," Buffy admits warily, thinking back to the files in Graham's office. Decades' worth of the same reports filed over, and over, and over… "But since I got here, I haven't exactly been living the same day on repeat. What gives?"

"As you say – your arrival changed everything."

It's not _exactly_ what she said, but she lets him have it.

"You are the key," Dracula continues. "The Queen's grip loosens. With every step you take closer to the truth, her curse crumbles further. For some, the haze of false memories is beginning to lift. But you have not broken it yet."

"Back up a second," Buffy says, navigating around a fallen tree-limb with only minimal swerving. "I'm willing to admit that something is very off about this town. Something curse-like, even. But it sounds like you actually believe that Storybrooke is full of fairytale characters."

"And you do not?"

"Um, no."

"Why?" Dracula presses, leaning towards her across the console separating their seats. She struggles with herself to keep both hands on the wheel instead of reaching for her stake. "Because it is too fantastical? Like the existence of vampires and demons, perhaps?"

"Point taken," Buffy admits grudgingly. They've reached the main road by this point and she turns left at random with half an idea that she should drive past the docks before doing a circuit of the residential streets.

As though he's just realized that he's in a moving vehicle, Dracula looks around with a touch of bemusement. "Where are we going?"

"I'm covering the night shift," Buffy explains. "We're patrolling the town. Keeping an eye out for hooligans. Miscreants. Ne'er-do-wells."

"Is this a 'keep your enemies closer' scenario?" Dracula queries, gesturing to himself.

"I don't know," Buffy replies evenly, eyes trained on the road ahead. "Are we enemies?"

Dracula is silent for a long moment. Buffy gets the impression that he is seriously considering her question. The docks flicker by outside the car windows, quiet and barren. No trouble here.

"I am on your side," Dracula says finally.

Buffy wrinkles her nose. What a weird thing to say. It's not at all the answer she was expecting. Cryptic mumbo jumbo about darkness and destiny? Absolutely. A somber statement of solidarity? _Not exactly living up to the Dark Prince stereotype, Drac._

"Side. What side?" she asks. "I'm not here to fight anyone, and I _don't_ need your help."

"Let us just say that our interests are temporarily aligned."

It's a terrible line. She's pretty sure he lifted it straight from a George Clooney movie. _Okay, this is getting us nowhere_. In a fit of exasperated pique, she pulls over to the side of the road.

"WHAT interests?" she demands. "Say I believe you – fairytales are real, evil queen, big curse – what's your _angle_? Why do you _care_? Did you wake up from your dirt nap one day and think, 'I know what will alleviate the boredom of all this pesky immortality! A quick trip to a cursed backwater town in Maine where I can torment Buffy!'" She narrows her eyes at him. "Seriously, if that's what happened I am going to drown you in a puddle of holy water."

Dracula frowns. "Where would you find a puddle of holy water?"

" _So_ not the point."

"Would you spill some first, and then…?"

"Forget the puddle."

"Perhaps you would seek to entrap me in –"

"I know what you're doing," Buffy interrupts. "You're changing the subject. You really suck at it."

"That's not all I suck."

"Wow, I remember you being suave, not twelve."

"I wish to return home."

"Feel free to get out and walk."

Dracula is silent. Buffy reconsiders his statement and then gapes at him. "Wait, you mean…?"

Dracula's gaze is steady in the dark. "Like you, I was not born in this world. I found a way to cross the divide long, long ago, but the way back was barred to me. At the time, I cared not. Now, I wish to return."

Buffy leans back in her seat, flabbergasted. "You're serious," she says.

"Yes. You have always known me to be different from the vampires of this world."

"I –" Buffy starts to say, when a sound catches her attention outside of the car.

Dracula hears it, too, and they both peer out through Buffy's window at the house they're parked across the street from. It's the Mayor's mansion. Buffy hadn't even realized they'd reached her street, let alone stopped in front of her house. She doesn't have time to dwell on the sinking feeling in her stomach, though, because the noise they had heard was the sound of a window opening, and of boots scrabbling over shingles. There is a dark figure climbing out of the Mayor's second-floor window.

Buffy's first thought is that Henry is sneaking out, but it's not Henry. It's definitely a man, or something man-sized. She squints through the fogged-up car window and then her eyes narrow as she recognizes the profile. It's _Graham_.

Stone-faced, she yanks her door open and strides across the street to cut him off. Because of the epic landscaping that shrouds Regina's residence, he doesn't see her approaching until he's tripping over her outstretched foot.

"Oh, hey, Graham!" she greets him mock-cheerfully. "How's it going?"

Graham looks up at her from the bottom of the driveway, lips parted in surprise. "Buffy?"

"I'm great, thanks for asking!" she responds as if they're exchanging pleasantries. "Work's going well, no calls at the station, I'm just doing a quick patrol of the town before locking up – you know, keeping an eye out for strange men jumping out of windows."

Graham winces and drags himself to his feet. "Ah, Buffy…"

"How were the dogs?"

"Listen. I can explain."

"Save it," Buffy scoffs, her temperament shifting. "I'm not interested in anything you have to say right now." She turns to go.

"Buffy, please, it's not what you think."

She whirls back around to face him. She's angry. Maybe angrier than she has a right to be, but she's touchy when it comes to Regina. "I don't care what it is! Frankly, it's none of my business what you do in your personal time. But you lied to my face, Graham. Presumably so you could answer a booty call, which I can't even – " She cuts herself off. Takes a breath. "Nope. Don't care. Here, take the keys. You're finishing my shift."

She starts to hand him the keys and then remembers that Dracula is still in the car. _Shit_. This night is not going to plan. She turns to deal with that first, only to find the car empty and Dracula standing half a pace behind her. She hadn't even heard him open the door, stealthy bastard.

She turns back to Graham. "Here," she says again, and shoves the keys into his hand.

"Who's your friend?" Graham asks, staring at Dracula past her shoulder. There's a faint note of accusation in his voice, like he's just caught _her_ doing something unsavory instead of the other way around.

"John," Dracula introduces himself blandly.

"Graham Humbert," Graham offers, along with his hand, his inherent good-boy politeness taking over. "I'm the sheriff in Storybrooke. Are you new in town?"

"Yes," Buffy interrupts before Dracula can say – well, anything. She still doesn't know what his game is, but she knows the last thing she wants is for him to be swapping stories with Graham-I'm-a-big-fat-liar-Humbert. "I was just showing him around. Good _night_ , Graham," she adds with finality. She grabs Dracula's elbow and pulls him roughly away.

Three streets and a sufficient number of privacy hedges safely between them and the Mayor's mansion, she slows their pace and glances up at her silent companion.

"John?" she remarks dryly.

"It is a very common name," Dracula explains. "Do you prefer I introduce myself as Dracula?"

"I'd prefer you didn't introduce yourself to anyone at all," Buffy tells him honestly. "And while we're on the subject – you will not, under _any circumstances_ , bite, sniff, lick, or even fantasize about anyone's neck."

"Does that mean you are not going to stake me?"

"Oh, staking is always an option. One day, I might even find a way to make it stick. But I want the full story first. If I'm going to help you break this curse, I want the truth."

"As I said – I tire of this world. I wish to – "

"ACK!" she cuts him off. "No wishing! Sheesh, don't you know anything?"

"Come," Dracula says, reaching for her hand. "I would like to show you something."

Buffy takes it hesitantly, and before she can protest, Dracula has an arm wrapped around her waist and they're twenty feet above the ground, the cold air pressing sharply against her face: they're _flying_.


	4. The Curse 3

Buffy very nearly screams.

She quells the instinctive urge to wrench herself out of Dracula's grasp, which turns out to be a very good thing; they're twenty feet above the pavement by the time her stunned brain registers what's happening. Then she panics, and digs her fingers into Dracula's ribs so hard it must hurt even his undead flesh, absolutely terrified that he's going to drop her. She's fallen from this height once before and it hadn't ended well.

Dracula tightens his hold on her, his arm like a steel band around her waist. Panic abating slightly, she opens her mouth to ask him just what he's playing at – but it turns out to be a colossally bad idea. She takes a breath to berate him and swallows a mouthful of freezing air the wrong way, and descends into a fit of coughing.

Eyes streaming, feeling like she's hacking up a lung, it's all Buffy can do to keep her balance when they land a few seconds later, right in the middle of an old oak tree. The tree's icy limbs are slippery and they creak and groan under the sudden weight of two bodies, but the oak is ancient and massive; it holds them, and they manage not to slide off.

"A little warning next time!" she admonishes quietly. Quietly, because it's getting late and she doesn't care to explain to whoever owns this tree what she's doing up it with a vampire at this late hour. Or any hour. "What's so special about a tree?"

"Through the window," Dracula replies, near-silent. Buffy's keen hearing picks it up easily and she follows his gaze to the window in question.

It's on the second floor of the building beside their tree, slightly lower than their branch. They have a good vantage point to peer inside. The room beyond is large and brightly lit. It's practically devoid of furniture with only a loveseat and a couple of folding chair clustered in one corner, and a few tables dotting the space. Mostly, the room is full of canvases. Some with half-finished paintings on them, some blank, others just the wooden frames waiting to be stretched and primed, they line the walls, leaning in stacks of three or four so only slivers of color and shapes are visible over the top of the ones in front.

A woman stands in the center of the room, half-obscured by the easel she's working at. The canvas is angled away from the window so Buffy can't see the painting. Whatever it's of, it's massive; nearly as tall as the artist herself.

The woman is pretty, with a round face and red-brown curls that gleam copper in the light. Her expression is one of intense concentration. _Obsession_ , Buffy thinks as she watches her work. From this distance, it's difficult to make out the exact color of her eyes, but they dart back and forth across her canvas like lightning, quick and assured.

Buffy tilts her head back to catch Dracula's eye. "Please tell me we're spying on this poor woman for a reason," she implores.

Dracula is so pale and still above her, his face might as well be carved out of stone. For a long moment, Buffy thinks he isn't going to answer her. She nudges him with her boot. "Hey, you still with me?"

"Her name is Mina," Dracula says finally. "She was once my wife."

Buffy's mouth falls open in surprise. "Seriously?" She swivels her gaze back to the window. "Okay, wow, not what I was expecting. How does that work, exactly? You mean she was part of your harem, or whatever, back in magic land?"

Dracula makes a noise of derision. "There was no harem. There was only Wilhelmina."

"When you came here, why did she stay behind?" Buffy asks.

"There is always a price," Dracula utter softly, his accent thicker with emotion. "We argued. She believed me to have changed from the man she had married. Our dispute was full of rage and passion. We went our separate ways. Soon after, I found my way here, to this world. It was some time before I realized that I could not go back. Mina was lost to me forever." He tears his eyes away from the window to look down at Buffy with dark eyes. "Until now."

"The curse," Buffy says, understanding dawning on her. "That's your angle. If I break it…"

"Mina will remember herself," Dracula finishes. "She will remember who I am to her."

"What if she's still pissed at you?" Buffy challenges.

"A likely scenario," Dracula concedes. "Mina…she is like the sun. Bright and full of fire. It is still better to be hated by her than to be forgotten." He turns his gaze back to the window. "She does not deserve this fate."

Buffy looks back at Mina. Her lip is caught between her teeth as her brush flows steadily across the canvas in front of her.

"She looks happy," Buffy points out.

"She is a shadow!" Dracula snarls. "A marionette! Doomed to paint the same inane pictures over and over and over again… _ach_!" He closes his eyes, relenting slightly. "She is trapped here, and I do not know how to break this curse."

 _He's absolutely heartbroken,_ Buffy thinks, and she's only half-shocked by the notion that the infamous Count Dracula has a heart to _be_ broken in the first place. _The slayer handbook did_ not _cover this, but really, what's new there?_

She hesitates, fighting an internal battle. After a long moment, she rests a comforting hand on Dracula's shoulder as they continue to watch the oblivious Mina paint on.

* * *

The next day at work, Buffy _drags_.

Once again, she'd left Dracula's castle as the sun was rising, and after two nights of no sleep, her exhaustion has caught up to her. She drinks approximately an entire pot of coffee before bundling herself up like a mummy and stumbles back out into the cold. She considers calling in sick, but she doesn't want it to look like she's just doing it to avoid Graham.

Ugh, Graham. She'd almost forgotten about _that_ lovely little slice of awkward.

She detours into Granny's to inhale a plate of waffles and ponder the situation. A part of her wants to shake Graham and scream _'What were you thinking?!'_ but by the time she finishes off her breakfast, she's resolved to take the higher ground. She isn't in a place to judge Graham's personal life choices, and she's not a prude, so who cares if he's sneaking around with Regina? It's not like Buffy has any right to police who he dates, or who Regina dates; even if the mayor _is_ Henry's adoptive mom. It totally sucks that he lied about it, but Buffy's got bigger problems to deal with right now.

She repeats this mantra to herself as she enters the station. She's early again, but Graham's already in his office. He looks up when she enters, but she turns away pointedly and drops into her chair with extra emphasis, and he takes the hint.

 _Okay, so maybe it's the middle ground_.

They manage to coexist in blatant avoidance for the next several hours. There's filing to be done, and then more coffee to drink (until Buffy finally cuts herself off on caffeine for the day), and then the phones pick up with a series of mundane complaints that don't actually require physical action, but successfully keep them both busy until about noon. So far, Graham has only exited his office once (ostensibly to use the restroom, but on the way back, Buffy sees him throw back a couple of ibuprofen from the first aid cabinet) and Buffy has kept her eyes glued to her computer screen. He catches her eye as he swallows the pills, but Buffy's busy uh-hmm-ing on the phone and he drops his gaze and gives up, returning to his office.

But not five minutes after she hangs up the phone, he re-emerges with an air of agitated determination.

"You're upset," Graham tells her, stopping directly in front of her desk. He's close enough that she has to crane her neck to look him in the face, so she rolls her chair back while she tries to come up with an appropriate reply.

"You've been avoiding me all morning," he continues. "Since you saw me leaving Regina's last night."

"Since you lied to me, you mean?" Buffy corrects. "If I was avoiding you, I wouldn't be here. I'm just not in the mood to talk to you right now."

"I want to explain," Graham persists.

"Really, _really_ not interested. I don't care if you're dating Regina, Graham. I'm not even that mad at you for lying, I'm just annoyed that you made me an accomplice to your…your shenanigans!"

"Shenanigans?" Graham repeats, and wow, okay, as it turns out, Buffy _might_ be a little more upset about the whole situation than she's admitting, because the faint smile that Graham is trying to suppress over her choice of vocabulary is irrationally making her want to hit him in the face.

She stands up hurriedly and grabs a stack of paperwork to occupy her hands. Now that they've broken the awkward silence thing, she can go file it in his office.

"I think you're more upset than you're letting on," Graham pushes, hitting the nail on the head. Buffy's fingers tighten reflexively, crumpling the edges of the folders. "Can we talk about it, please?"

"Graham," Buffy sighs, making an effort to relax her hands, "it's fine. We can just pretend last night never happened, okay? Let's just go back to being friends – co-workers – friendly co-workers – whatever."

"Friends. And I don't want to pretend – I don't want you to – "

"To what?"

"You don't know what it's like with her!" Graham bursts out. "I don't feel anything! Can you understand that?"

"Yes," Buffy says sincerely. "I totally understand unhealthy relationships. But the only person who can fix yours is you. Me lecturing you isn't going to help."

"I don't want you to look at me the way you are now," Graham admits, eyes downcast.

"Why do you care how I look at you?"

"Because…"

And yes. Afterwards, Buffy realizes that she should have seen it coming from a mile away, but in the moment? She really can't think about anything except how much she doesn't want to be having this conversation, so when Graham leans across the desk and cradles her face in his hands and kisses her, Buffy is completely taken aback.

After a stunned second, they pull back simultaneously.

"What the hell was that?" Buffy demands at the same time Graham says, "Did you see that?"

"See what?" she asks suspiciously, squinting at him. She doesn't _think_ he's drunk, but he's staring past her into nothingness and his eyes _do_ look a little glazed. She snaps her fingers. "Earth to Graham."

Graham shakes his head, jolting himself out of whatever had caught his attention. "I'm sorry, I…" he trails off helplessly. Buffy arches an eyebrow and waits for the rest of his sentence. "I just need to feel something," he says finally. He looks pained, and there's still something in his eyes that Buffy doesn't like the look of. He's clearly rattled, and not just because of the kiss.

A wave of exhaustion rolls over Buffy as she rubs a hand across the back of her neck and wonders what she's done to deserve the week she's been having.

"I'm going home," she announces finally. "We can talk tomorrow, okay? About…all of this." She waves a hand vaguely, meaning _Regina, you lying to me, that kiss, this crazy cursed town we're supposed to be protecting._

"Buffy – "

"Tomorrow," Buffy repeats firmly. "I need sleep. I'm too tired to deal with this right now, but I promise we can talk about it tomorrow. I'm not going to start avoiding you, Graham, but I think we both could use a night to get our heads on straight. Okay?"

She doesn't really wait for an answer. She's got her parka on and half-way zipped by the time she's finished speaking, and finally he just nods, and she's out the door before he can get another word out.

The churning feeling in her gut feels a little like relief, and a lot like guilt.

* * *

She really does go home. She takes a 30-minute power nap, eats a sandwich, brushes her teeth, and feels somewhat human again. Picking up her coat from where she draped it across a chair-back, something in her pocket clinks against the wooden spindles and she remembers an idea she'd had the night before.

Checking the time, she thinks that school must still be in session.

* * *

"Pssst! Henry!"

Henry's head whips around. When he spots her, half-hidden behind a shelf of encyclopedias, his entire face lights up in a huge, megawatt grin. "Buffy!" he cries delightedly.

"Shhh!" Buffy hisses, and beckons him closer.

"What are you doing here?" Henry whispers, crouching down beside her. "Are you hiding?"

"What? No!" Buffy scoffs. "I'm the deputy sheriff – I'm checking on the safety of the school."

"Then why are we whispering?"

"Because we're in the library, duh." Buffy gestures around at all of the books. She's not a book snob, per say, but she can't keep some of her disdain out of her voice when she pronounces the word 'library.' The Storybrook Elementary and Middle School Library is lackluster, to say the least. "I wanted to talk to you," she continues before Henry can ask the dozen questions she can see bubbling to the surface. "It's Top Secret."

Henry's eyes widen. "Is this about Operation Cobra?" he asks breathily.

"Not exactly," Buffy hedges, "but there's definitely some crossover."

"Then what is it?" Henry demands impatiently, forgetting to lower his voice in his excitement.

" _Shhhh_ ," Buffy hushes him again. Henry looks chastised. "This is important, okay?"

He nods solemnly. "Okay, I'm listening."

"Okay." Buffy takes a breath. She's never really had to give anyone 'The Talk' before who hadn't already stumbled headfirst into the knowledge. Hopefully Henry's willingness to believe in curses and magical forests will make it a little easier. "This world is older than you know," she begins, reaching back into her memory for the rehearsed speech Giles liked to give the newbies. "Before there were humans, demons walked the earth – this earth," she clarifies. "Not fairytale land."

"The Enchanted Forest," Henry corrects her automatically, and then what she'd said sinks in. "But I thought this world doesn't have magic!"

"This town might be magic-free, no whip, but the rest of the world is full fat mojo," Buffy confirms. "But getting back to the vampires, demons, and forces of darkness – they're real. They're scary. They're very dangerous. I want you to be careful, okay?"

"You think there are vampires here? In Storybrook?"

"I _know_ there are," Buffy says firmly. "At least one. I have a truce with him at the moment, but you still need to be careful. Here, I have something for you. For protection." She pulls a crucifix out of her pocket and holds it out to him.

Henry takes it, letting the chain slip through his fingers until it dangles off of them. He holds it up, studying the silver cross. "Do these really work?" His tone is skeptical, and Buffy tries not to roll her eyes. _That's_ the part he finds far-fetched?

"It won't kill a vampire, but it might slow one down."

"I'm not Catholic," Henry tells her solemnly.

"Doesn't matter, neither am I – you can wear it under your shirt and no one will see it and ask questions, 'kay?"

Henry puts it over his head immediately.

"How do you know about all this?" he asks.

"It's a long story."

Henry gives her a look that says _not good enough_.

Buffy relents. "Before I came to Storybrooke, it was my job to fight them," she explains. It's bound to come up sooner or later. She might as well just come clean now. "I'm a Vampire Slayer."

"Woah!" Henry breathes. "That is so cool!"

"And secret. Very, very secret. It's like a whole secret identity thing. Okay? Don't tell anyone."

"I won't!" Henry says vehemently, shaking his head, and then another thought occurs to him. "Can you take me with you to hunt vampires?"

"Nope!" Buffy says, standing up hurriedly. "Not until you're like, fifteen, at least. _And_ – " she continues loudly over his protests " – I have a truce, remember?"

Henry pouts, but nods.

"Two more things you need to know about vamps," Buffy tells him, eager to distract him from this latest loss. "Number one: never verbally invite _anyone_ inside of your house. Vampires look like normal people most of the time, but they can't cross the threshold unless they're invited. Got it?"

Henry nods again. "What's number two?"

"Number two is, vampires can't go out in the sunlight. They'll fry."

"Everyone knows that," Henry says, deflating slightly.

Buffy is saved from having to defend herself by the bell that signals the end of the period. "I gotta go," she says quickly. "Don't tell anyone I was here. Top Secret, remember?"

"Got it," Henry says firmly.

Buffy grins at him, ruffles his hair, and stealthily exits the library.

* * *

She rounds the corner and nearly collides with someone going the opposite direction.

Buffy sidesteps just in the nick of time and throws out a hand to catch the other woman's elbow before she topples over. She manages to stay upright, but the movement knocks an armful of paintbrushes to the floor.

"Oh!" the woman cries out in surprise.

"Sorry!" Buffy apologizes quickly, and stoops to pick them up. "I wasn't looking…"

"…where I was going," the other woman finishes her own apology in tandem, seeming not to notice that Buffy has trailed off and is staring at her.

It's Wilhelmina, the painter. Mina, Dracula's long lost love.

"Hi!" she says sheepishly, still grappling with the fallen brushes with one hand as she sticks out her free one to shake. "Wilma Murray. The art teacher."

"Buffy Summers," Buffy says in polite bewilderment, and shakes her hand. _What are the odds?_ she thinks, amazed. _Then again, leprechauns and coincidences…_ "I'm Henry's – I mean, I'm the new – I'm new," she settles on finally, and winces at her own awkwardness.

Mina – Wilma - whatever her name is – laughs. "I know who you are," she assures Buffy as she shoves the reclaimed bushel of paint brushes into the large pocket on the front of her paint-splattered denim apron. "It's not very often we get new people in Storybrooke."

"So I've heard," Buffy agrees with a chuckle of her own.

"I'm sure you're so _tired_ of hearing it by now, though," Wilma correctly guesses. "Sorry."

"It's just a little weird, you know?" Buffy says, as though she's just come to the realization. "It seems like no one can remember the last time someone new moved to town…or left. That's weird, don't you think?"

"I suppose," Wilma agrees slowly. "I've honestly never thought about it. Storybrooke is a small town." She shrugs. "I guess people like what they're comfortable with."

"I mean, I lived in a really small town back in California, but people came and went all the time," Buffy presses, eager suddenly to get someone to admit that something is wrong with the town.

"Oh, you're from California?" Wilma interjects. "I'd love to visit the West Coast! There's a fascinating art scene out there!"

"You should totally go," Buffy encourages her. "Teachers have the summer off, right? Take a road trip!"

"Maybe," Wilma says noncommittally.

Sensing the conversation slipping away, Buffy scrambles for something to say to keep Wilma's attention.

"My mom used to own an art gallery, actually," she tells her. "Are you a painter, sculptor…?"

Wilma visibly brightens. "Oh, that must have been amazing!" she says sincerely. "I paint, mostly."

"Abstracts? Still life?" Buffy wracks her brain, trying to come up with the right terms. "Nudes?"

Wilma laughs. "All of the above, at one time or another. Right now I'm going through a figurative phase, but there aren't a lot of people willing to model for me. Small town, right? Hey – " She pauses, a spark of excitement in her eye. "Do you think you might like to sit for a portrait sometime? It doesn't have to be nude!" she hurries to add when she sees Buffy's startled expression. "You can think about it, if you want."

"Um, okay," Buffy says, still surprised. "Yeah, I'll think about it."

"I can show you around my studio, let you see some of my work before you make up your mind?" Wilma offers.

It's the perfect in, all wrapped up in pretty paper with an elaborate bow on top. Buffy would be an idiot not to seize the chance to investigate further. Plus, Wilma's nice and Buffy doesn't have many friends here yet. And maybe one day, after she deals with this curse business, they can bond over the perils and pitfalls of dating vampires.

"How about Saturday?" Buffy suggests. "We could meet for coffee before?"

Wilma beams at her.

* * *

Graham doesn't show up for work the next morning.

She gives him an hour before she tries calling his cell phone. It goes straight to voicemail. She wants to believe that he's simply overslept, but as the minutes tick by, that scenario becomes less and less likely.

Is he avoiding her? She can almost believe that possibility (yesterday was Awkward with a capital 'A') but _he_ had been the one who wanted to talk in the first place. Had he changed his mind? Maybe. Buffy chews anxiously on a hangnail while she considers it. In the end, she dismisses is. Graham's a decent guy, poor relationship choices aside. She's known enough not-so-decent guys to be able to tell the difference. If he was going to fake being sick to prolong their inevitably uncomfortable conversation, he would call.

Right?

She plays a round or twelve of darts to clear her thoughts and try to figure out what to do.

It's mid-afternoon when her phone finally rings, and she accidentally sinks her next dart into the board and the drywall beyond, halfway up the shaft. She leaves it there and digs her phone out from under the jumbled mess of papers on her desk. The caller ID reads 'MMB'.

She answers the call with as much cheerful energy as she can muster. "Hey, what's up?"

" _Buffy? I'm worried about Graham,"_ Mary Margaret begins without preamble.

"Yeah, me too," Buffy says, but she's surprised to hear that her roommate is on the same page. "Have you seen him? He didn't show up today."

" _He was just here at the school,"_ Mary Margaret explains. _"He seems…weird."_

Buffy frowns. "What did he want?"

" _He kept asking me all of these questions, about how we – he and I – knew each other, and for how long…And he was burning up, Buffy. I think he has a fever, I told him to go home and rest but I don't know if he will. His behavior was very erratic. Did he say anything weird at work yesterday?"_

Buffy considers, briefly, telling Mary Margaret about the surprise kiss, or about Graham's secret relationship with Regina, but she's not sure how to phrase it so it doesn't sound like there's something going on between her and Graham (which there _isn't_ ) and that's really not the point right now.

"We sort of argued," she admits instead.

" _About what?!"_

"Nothing, it was stupid. I…found out something personal about him, and he was embarrassed," Buffy explains, skirting the actual facts. "And I was really tired, so I kind of snapped at him. But we said we'd talk about it today. He seemed okay when I left."

" _I don't know,"_ Mary Margaret says, worry clear in her voice. _"Maybe you should check on him?"_

"What did you guys talk about, exactly?" Buffy asks.

" _Just what I said – he asked me all of these questions, talking about past lives…I said he must have read Henry's book."_ She laughs a little on the other end of the line.

The book.

 _God, I'm such an idiot_ , Buffy thinks. Not once since her epiphany about the curse has she thought to take a closer look at Henry's book. Giles would be incredibly disappointed in her.

"I'll try his phone again," Buffy says into the receiver.

Mary Margaret lets out a sigh of relief in a giant _woosh_. _"Okay, I'll let you go. Talk tonight?"_

"Yeah, okay. And hey – don't think I didn't notice those flowers this morning!" Buffy teases, but when she hangs up, her face is serious. Her spidey sense is tingling, and she's willing to bet the entire shoe department at Nordstrom's that whatever is really going on with Graham is somehow tied to Henry's and Dracula's curse theory.

She goes to consult the resident expert.

As it turns out, Henry's assistance isn't needed for her immediate problem – before she reaches the door to the mayor's mansion, Graham walks through it. Buffy eyes him critically as he approaches. He's tense, and that wild look is back in his eyes.

"Howdy, partner," she says faux-nonchalantly. "Fancy meeting you here. Again."

"That's not why I was – " Graham stops himself and takes a breath. "I needed to talk to Henry about my heart. About everything that's going on, I mean."

"Yeah," Buffy agrees sagely, "ten-year-olds usually give the best romantic advice."

"Not that," Graham insists. "I mean my _heart_." He clutches at his chest as though to illustrate his point. "She has it. She must. That's why I can't feel anything." He's close to tears as he says this.

"Did Henry's book tell you that?" Buffy asks, a strange feeling passing over her. There's no need to ask who 'she' is.

"Yes, it – wait, you believe me?" Graham looks at her cautiously. "You believe in the curse?"

"Yeah, yeah, evil queen, enchanted forest, no magic," Buffy summarizes impatiently with a wave of her hand. "I'm just a little fuzzy on the details, which is what I was coming to talk to Henry about, but right now I am totally distracted by that wolf."

She points. Graham swings around wildly. Across the street, a wolf with bi-colored eyes raises its head to look at them before trotting off.

"It's the wolf from my dreams!" Graham tells her excitedly. "It's trying to help me find my heart."

"I _told_ you I wasn't drinking when I flattened that sign," Buffy grouses, but he's already running down the street after the wolf, so she follows.

The wolf leads them to a cemetery.

"Surprise, surprise," Buffy mutters under her breath. Graham doesn't notice. He's staring at the symbol adorning the crypt they've been led to. Inside a circle is a pair of stylized antlers, like some sort of stone crown. "Graham?"

"My heart. It's in there," Graham confirms. He pulls a flashlight from his pocket and looks at her. "I have to look in there."

"Obviously," Buffy agrees. "Hold on – " She tries the door, finds it to be locked, and gives it a short, sharp push. It swings open without much protest, and she darts through ahead of him, on the alert for any lurking danger.

The tomb is empty.

"It's got to be here somewhere," Graham insists, scanning the walls. "There's got to be a hidden door. A lever. Something."

Buffy eyes the sarcophagus in the center of the crypt. "Do you think," she starts to say, but stops abruptly when a noise outside catches her attention. "Oh, crap," she says out loud, but it's too late.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Regina yells, staring at them through the open door.

"Nothing!" Buffy says hastily. "What are _you_ doing?"

"Bringing flowers to my father's grave." Regina fixes her with an acidic glare, that only turns fouler when she sees Graham with her.

"Don't blame her," Graham says, pushing past Buffy. "It's my fault."

"Yes," Buffy agrees, trying to stealthily elbow him into silence. "The sheriff thought he heard something in here. We were investigating. Might have been an animal."

"Really?" Regina asks, looking at Graham with one eyebrow raised.

"Uh, yes. But it was…it was nothing."

Buffy tries not to groan. Graham is worse at this than she is.

"You don't look well, dear," Regina tells him, adopting a worried expression. "Let's take you home." She grabs his arm and starts to pull him away.

Graham yanks his arm away from her. "Regina, I…I don't want to go home. Not with you."

"Oh?" Regina says. "But you'll go with her."

"What?" Buffy squawks. "That's not – _we're_ not – what?"

"It has nothing to do with her," Graham says, shaking his head. "You know, I've realized that I don't feel anything Regina. And I know now it's not me – it's you."

"So, you're leaving me for her?"

"I'm leaving you for me," Graham counters. He's surprisingly calm now.

"Graham, you're not thinking straight."

"Actually, for the first time, I am. I'd rather have nothing than settle for less. Nothing? Is better than what we have. I need to feel something, Regina, and the only way to do that is to give myself a chance."

"Graham – "

"I'm sorry. It's over."

Regina looks at Buffy. "I don't know what I ever did to you, Miss Summers, to deserve this. To have you keep coming after everything – "

"Oh my god, shut up," Buffy pleads. "This is not about me. This is about you, not letting go when someone _clearly_ doesn't want anything to do with you anymore!"

Regina stares at her. "Excuse me?"

"You're poisonous, Regina," Buffy tells her point blank. "It's no wonder everyone runs away from you."

Regina lashes out. She has good aim and her anger lends her strength, but Buffy catches her fist easily.

"Not a good move," Buffy advises, still holding Regina's hand captive. She glances sideways at Graham. His face is pale beneath the scruff. Regina's breathing is harsh and angry in the hush of the cemetery. Buffy slowly uncurls her fingers and releases her. Regina falls back, clutching her hand. "Don't try that again," Buffy advises her, and turns on her heel to stalk off across the graveyard.

Graham catches up to her in a couple of long-legged strides. "Are you alright?" he asks lowly.

Buffy doesn't answer at first, but when they pass another crypt, she pulls him abruptly behind it, a finger to her lips. "Shhh," she whispers, and beckons him to follow her as she silently picks her way back through the cemetery towards the Mills crypt.

They tip-toe around the side, Buffy straining her ears for a sign of any activity within. Very cautiously, she leans in to peer through the door that Regina left slightly ajar.

 _Oh, I so totally called it about the sarcophagus,_ she thinks smugly, and straightens with a triumphant grin.

"Come on," she tells Graham, and pulls him in after her by the front of his leather jacket.

His feeble protests splutter out at the sight of the eerily-lit staircase leading downwards into the belly of the tomb where the sarcophagus had been resting. Buffy gestures to the stairs, and he nods. They move forward together and begin the descent.

It's not far down, and then there's a long hallway, with ornate patterning on the floor and empty sconce holders lining the walls. Graham moves like a shadow beside her, silent and ghostly. At the end of the hall, Regina's back is silhouetted within a curtained alcove, and she's removing a small chest from what looks like a wall of safety deposit boxes.

Despite their best efforts at stealth, Regina hears or senses them. She spins around suddenly, and Buffy is alarmed to discover that she is holding a heart in her gloved hand. It's glowing a bright, bloody red. It looks like it's made of crystal or stone, but Buffy _knows_ , just by looking at it, that somehow, in a magical world kind of way, that it's the real deal. That's Graham's heart in Regina's hand. That's Graham's _heart_.

Beside her, he makes a soft sound like a whimper. Regina's eyes are still wide with surprise, but she recovers quickly.

"You've made a terrible mistake, Miss Summers," she tells Buffy grimly. "You should never have come to Storybrooke." She lifts the heart high, turning it to study the effect of the light.

"Give it back, Regina," Buffy says coldly.

"This?" Regina asks, pausing for affect. "This heart belongs to _me_."

"It belongs to Graham."

Regina gives the heart a squeeze, and Graham doubles over, clutching is chest with a groan.

"I think it's mine," Regina muses, watching him gasp for breath as her fingers dig into the organ. "Mine to keep…and mine to di – "

She doesn't finish the words _dispose of_ , because at that exact second, Buffy punches her square in the face and she goes down like a sack of potatoes, out cold. The crystalline heart tumbles from her grasp and lands at Buffy's feet, unharmed.

Buffy looks up at Graham, who's staring back at her with wide eyes.

"Oops?"


End file.
